1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to carriers for personal effects, e.g., wallets, clutches and purses, and, more particularly, to personal carriers with a selectively accessible card holding pocket.
2. Description of the Related Art
Transaction cards carrying data are currently in widespread use around the world. For example, one common application of transaction cards is financial account management cards, such as credit cards and bank cards. The data associated with such financial management cards includes account numbers and related customer information, which can be used in conjunction with a worldwide network of card reading machines to pay for goods, conduct banking activities and transfer funds. The card reading machines have varying configurations designed to read and/or record the data associated with the card, including credit card readers at customer checkouts within stores, automatic bank teller machines (ATM's), and other devices.
Other applications for data-containing transaction cards include: identification, such as driver licenses and government-issued identification cards; employee access cards, for managing employee access and movement around employer property; student identifications, for managing individualized access to school campuses and student services; and other cards used for identification and/or the rendering of services. Yet another use of transaction cards includes customer loyalty cards, which are sometimes used by retailers to collect customer preference data at a point of sale.
One common method for associating data with a card is a magnetic strip overlaid onto a portion of one of the card's two broad faces. This magnetic strip can be passed through a card reader, such as by “swiping” the card along a unidirectional path through the card reader, i.e., from a reader inlet to a reader outlet. Typically, a user performs such swiping motion by grasping the nonmagnetic body of the card and passing the magnetic strip through the reader.
Another data associating technology includes bar codes, which may be printed on a portion of one face of the card and optically scanned by a bar code reader. Yet another data associating technology is radio frequency identification (RFID), in which the card includes an RFID “tag” containing an electromagnetic field coil. When the RFID tag is placed to into an electromagnetic field, the coil is induced to emit a coded identification number which may be read by the reader device.
For the magnetic strip and bar code data association methods, the strip or bar code must be physically presented to the reader device, and may not be covered or concealed. For RFID embedding technologies, the associated data may be read even if the RFID tag is covered, provided such covering does shield the RFID tag from the electromagnetic field.
Moreover, the magnetic strip method of associating data with cards is the predominant method utilized for credit cards and bank cards, which in turn are the predominant transaction cards in present circulation. Accordingly, substantial design efforts have been focused on providing systems for easily and efficiently carrying and presenting cards having data associated with the cards via magnetic strips.
For example, wallets and/or purses commonly include one or more card pockets designed to securely retain a standard-size transaction card within the wallet or purse until needed, at which time the card may be removed from the pocket, presented to a card reader, and then replaced. However, repeated removal and replacement of the card from the wallet card pocket increases the potential for the card to be damaged, lost, or misplaced.
Other designs include card holders which cover only a portion of the card while another portion of the card protrudes from the card holder to allow it to communicate with appropriate device interfaces. Such designs leave the information association technology, such as a magnetic strip, permanently exposed. Such card holders are often attached to lanyards, keychains or the like, and therefore render the card and, in particular, the magnetic strip, vulnerable to damage and abrasion during transport and storage.
What is needed is an improvement over the foregoing.